Location

Donmar Warehouse 41 Earlham Street London WC2H 9LX

Box Office

020 3282 3808
Mon - Sat: 10:00AM - 6:00PM

More Information

Monday 31 July, 5.45pm: Are we still afraid of powerful women?

Emma Barnett (host) is an award-winning broadcaster and journalist. Host of the BBC 5 Live's morning programme, 5 Live Daily, and regular presenter of BBC Woman's Hour, Emma is no stranger to interviewing powerful women - her most recent interviewee being the Prime Minister herself. Emma also presents BBC One's Sunday Morning Live debate programme, writes a weekly advice column in the Sunday Times called Tough Love and created a TEDx talk on female ambition entitled: The Secrets That Snails Can Teach Women About Success. Follow her @emmabarnett

Katherine Bennett OBE is Senior Vice President, Airbus in the UK. Reporting directly to Airbus CEO, Tom Enders, Katherine is responsible for all of Airbus Public Affairs functions in the UK and the Airbus London office. During more than a decade at the Company, she has also held roles in Communications and spent more than two years based at Airbus HQ in Toulouse, France running the global public affairs function.Katherine’s previous employment was with General Motors UK where she headed up their government affairs function and prior to that worked for Hill and Knowlton Public Relations in London.She was awarded an OBE in June 2004 for services to industry and charity, and has served on various boards of public/private enterprises focused on economic development in UK regions and serves on the Council of ADS (the UK aerospace trade association). In December 2015 she became a Board Member of the International Aviation Womens’ Association and was nominated a fellow of the Royal Aeronautical Society in March 2016.

Sabrina Mahfouz was raised in London and Cairo. Her work includes the plays Chef, With a Little Bit of Luck, Clean, Battleface and the love i feel is red; the poetry collection How You Might Know Me; the literary anthology The Things I Would Tell You: British Muslim Women Write and the BBC shows Breaking the Code, Railway Nation: A Journey In Verse and We Are Here. She received a Fringe First Award for Chef and won a Sky Arts Academy Poetry Award.

Genista (Jenny) McIntosh (Baroness McIntosh of Hudnall) has held a number of senior positions in major arts organisations. She was Executive Director of the Royal National Theatre between 1990 and 1996 and again between 1997 and 2002, and was Chief Executive of the Royal Opera House in 1997. She was Principal of the Guildhall School of Music & Drama from 2002 to 2003. Between 1972 and 1984, and again between 1986 and 1990, she held a number of posts at the Royal Shakespeare Company. She was a founder Trustee of NESTA (National Endowment for Science, Technology and the Arts) from 1998 to 2005 and currently serves on the Boards of the Royal Shakespeare Company and Southbank Sinfonia.Genista holds honorary doctorates from the University of York, the University of Middlesex and City University and received an Honorary Fellowship from Goldsmiths College, University of London in 2003. She is also a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts. In 1999 she was created a Life Peer, taking the title Baroness McIntosh of Hudnall, and now devotes most of her time to her work in the House of Lords.

Tuesday 1 August, 5.45pm: Who would want to be an MP?

Stewart Wood (Lord Wood of Anfield, host) is a Labour member of the House of Lords. He served as a senior special adviser to Gordon Brown at both 11 and 10 Downing Street, and worked alongside Ed Miliband during his time as Leader of the Opposition in his Shadow Cabinet. Stewart is an academic at Oxford University, and is on the board of the Royal Court Theatre.

Rushanara Ali MP is the Labour Member of Parliament for Bethnal Green and Bow. She was first elected in May 2010 with a majority of 11,574, having defeated George Galloway’s Respect Party. Bethnal Green and Bow was one of four Labour gains in 2010. Rushanara was re-elected in 2015 doubling her majority to 24,317 and earning 61% of the share of the vote.

Stephen Bush is special correspondent at the New Statesman. His daily briefing, ‘Morning Call’, provides a quick and essential guide to domestic and global politics.

Kwasi Kwarteng MP has been the Conservative Member of Parliament for Spelthorne since 2010. Born in London in 1975, Kwasi was educated at Eton College, where he was a King’s Scholar, and at Trinity College, Cambridge, where he took his BA in Classics and History. After a year as a Kennedy Scholar at Harvard University, Kwasi returned to Cambridge to complete his PhD in History.Prior to entering Parliament, Kwasi worked as a financial analyst and author. Since being elected, Kwasi has served on a number of select committees and, having served as Parliamentary Private Secretary (PPS) to the Leader of the House of Lords, Kwasi is currently PPS to the Chancellor of the Exchequer. In addition to his political career, Kwasi is also a widely known historian. His first book, Ghosts of Empire, was published in 2011. His second book, War & Gold, was published in 2014. Most recently, Thatcher’s Trial was published in 2015.

Wednesday 2 August, 5.45pm: What does the future of the media look like?

Janine Gibson (host) is the editor-in-chief of BuzzFeed UK, running the news team in London and overseeing all editorial content since September 2015. Prior to BuzzFeed, Gibson worked at the Guardian for 17 years, most notably launching the Guardian US in 2013 and overseeing its Pulitzer Prize–winning reporting of the Edward Snowden leaks. Her other roles at the Guardian included media editor, launching and editing the mediaguardian.co.uk website and editor of theguardian.com.

Afua Hirsch is a writer, broadcaster, barrister and human rights lawyer. She covered social affairs for Sky News and was previously a correspondent for the Guardian. She is the author of Brit(ish), a book about Britishness and identity, published in January by Jonathan Cape.

Helen Lewis is deputy editor of the New Statesman and a regular presenter of the BBC’s Week in Westminster. She tweets @helenlewis

Alistair Smith is editor of the Stage. He has also written on theatre for publications ranging from the Guardian to Hello! and is the author of two major industry reports: the London Theatre Report and the Theatre Workforce Review.

Monday 7 August, 5.45pm: How do you write about real people?

Clare Slater (host) is Literary Manager at the Donmar Warehouse.

Tom Deering read music at Goldsmith’s College and the Royal academy of music. He is now a composer and Music Director, and composed the music for the Donmar’s verbatim musical Committee... Tom was named as an Associate of the Royal Academy of Music in the 2016 honours list.

Hadley Fraser has most recently co-written the book and lyrics for Committee... Hadley played real-life chess grandmaster Garry Kasparov in Matt Charman’s The Machine, amongst many other acting credits for the Donmar and beyond.

James Graham is a playwright and screenwriter. For the Donmar his plays include The Vote (2015), televised live on election night, and Privacy (2014). Other recent theatre includes Ink which recently opened at the Almeida Theatre, This House (2016, Chichester and West End; 2012, National Theatre) and Monster Raving Loony (2015, Plymouth Drum and Soho Theatre).

Michelle Terry is an actress and writer. She most recently appeared at the Donmar in Becoming: Part One, a verbatim piece about childbirth which she wrote and performed with Rosalie Craig. Along with Rob Hastie she co-wrote My Mark, a 10-year verbatim project collecting the thoughts from the young people of the UK about politics. Michelle has recently been announced as the next Artistic Director of the Globe.

Steve Waters is a playwright whose plays include Limehouse and Temple for the Donmar, and Little Platoons and The Contingency Plan for the Bush; he also writes for radio and television and is Senior Lecturer in Creative Writing at the University of East Anglia. His book The Secret Life of Plays is published by Nick Hern Books, as is all his other work.

Supported by

Social

Donation

Help us set theatre free for thousands of young people by making a donation towards YOUNG+FREE. Your donation will help fund our scheme for providing young people with free tickets to productions at the Donmar. Please give generously. We suggest a £20 donation.